"David Eddings - The Dreamers 02 - The Treasured One" - читать интересную книгу автора (Eddings David)

‘It doesn’t really fit,’ Keselo disagreed. ‘The Amarite church might want to come
here to the Land of Dhrall to harvest gold and slaves, but they’d need to know exactly
how to get through all that floating ice, and Gunda and Padan have the only maps.’

‘That’s true, I suppose,’ Veltan conceded, ‘but Narasan told me that he could field
a hundred thousand soldiers. It’d only take one opportunist to blow away any chance
of secrecy. I think that’s the answer to the origins of that second invasion in your little
boy’s dream, Dahlaine.’

‘It would explain it, I guess,’ I agreed. Then I looked at Keselo again. ‘Just exactly
what are “slaves”?’ I asked him. ‘I don’t believe I’ve ever heard that word before.’

‘You’ve been very lucky, then. It was a fairly standard custom back in the early
days of the Empire for the Imperial armies to capture people of more primitive
cultures and then sell them to the landowners of the Empire itself, almost as if they
were cattle. Then the landowners would hire men with whips to drive the unfortunates
to do the actual farming. The practice fell into disuse a hundred or so years ago, but a
few decades back the Church realized the she’d been passing up a wonderful
opportunity to make money, so the slavers are back in business again, and at least half
of them are members of the clergy.’

Veltan’s face went dead white. ‘If those monsters even come close to the shores of
my Domain, I’ll destroy them!’

‘No, Veltan,’ I told him quite firmly, ‘you won’t. Killing anything is absolutely
forbidden, and you know it. If you tried something like that, you’d be banished
forever, and it wouldn’t be to the moon this time. You’d spend the rest of eternity in a
place of absolute darkness where the only sounds you’d hear would be your own
screams of endless despair. I’m sure we’ll be able to find some suitable alternatives,
but if you even try to kill anything, I’ll tie you up in a knot so tight that it’ll take you
about four cycles just to unlace your fingers from your toes.’

‘So that’s why you people had to rush around hiring armies!’ Keselo exclaimed.
‘I’ve never really understood why you didn’t just obliterate the enemies with a wave
of your hand. It was because you’re not permitted to kill anything, isn’t it?’

‘I want you to forget what you just heard, young man,’ I told him firmly. ‘Do you
understand me?’
 ‘Why, yes, I believe I do.’

‘Good.’ I looked over at my brother, ‘You’d better tell Narasan to start moving his
fleet, Veltan,’ I suggested. ‘We’ve finished everything here in Zelana’s Domain, so
it’s time to move on. Ashad’s dream wasn’t too specific about time. That seems to be
one of the characteristics of these dreams. Our Dreamers can give us all kinds of
details about what’s going to happen, but “when” always seems a little vague.’

‘Did Ashad happen to mention where the main battle’s likely to take place?’
Veltan asked.

‘He said that it would be in the general vicinity of the Falls of Vash, little brother.